The year is 1938, and Mahatma Gandhi's groundbreaking philosophies are sweeping across India, but 8-year-old Chuyia, newly widowed, must go to live with other outcast widows on an ashram. Her presence transforms the ashram as she befriends two of her compatriots.
Direction
Mehta's Elements trilogy finale, shot under death threats and protest fires.
Cinematography
Ganges as character—holy, polluted, witness to hypocrisy.
Acting
Sarala, untrained Sri Lankan discovery, carries the film's moral weight.
Director
Deepa Mehta
Trivia, insights & behind the scenes
Hindu fundamentalists burned sets, issued death threats, and Mehta filmed secretly in Sri Lanka pretending it was Varanasi.
The 1856 Hindu Widows' Remarriage Act existed; this film asks why 1938 felt like 1856 for these women.
CA
